Tonya Anderson Interview

Vinny Sidoli

When I interviewed Tonya Anderson she gave a multitude of stories from her past to help us understand how we can affect our future. In her life she had lived through poverty, struggled with depression and abuse. Now after being healed, uses her compassion for human struggle to help others. Along with this she had, aside from joining the Naval Academy as a black woman, helped politicians run an office.

Now she uses her political connections to help raise awareness for violence not only against women, but around the world. Women have known struggle since the beginning of time and Anderson believes that we are beginning to see a change for the better. Anderson truly believes that we will and are going to eventually be rid of violence in our communities. She said, “The people of your generation will simply no longer accept violence.”

Not only is Anderson a compassionate woman, but her ideals are truly revolutionary. Although we all wish to achieve her goals, it is almost impossible for it ever to happen. All personal bias aside, Anderson is truly a visionary and whom we should model on how to handle our struggles in life, although she is not the perfect example of a human being, and she will be the first to tell you that she made mistakes. These are her faults, but in her faults she is freed from judgment and in being free she helps others become free themselves. She uses her struggles to show people that she is, indeed, human, like we all are. This is where we she can help our generation. Too much do we idolize and ostracize people in power. If they have flaws, we do not accept them even though they may help us more than the person we are idolizing. Anderson has helped put people into office who should be there and who actually care about the people.

Anderson has given much to her community and those around the world. She said she believes that this is possible because she is a person and that what she does is treat people as people. In her life she has done much wrong, and knows that it is likewise for us all, but she has the compassion and a transparent view to be able look past that and see person for who they are. It is this ability to connect with people that makes it easy for her to help people who have problems and see no way out.

In the interview, she had broken down and cried many times on many different stories that were quite personal. She did not fear showing her emotions, which is key, she said she believes, to self help. Too much do we hide our emotions and feel embarrassed about how we feel. Expressing yourself and having the ability to express yourself is the seed that grows a happy community, and a community that can breed love not hate and peace instead of violence.

Although Anderson is intuitive and her cause is noble, she aims high in her view of what the world is capable. People are indeed changing for the better but not at the pace she claims it to be. The problem with trying to change the world is the inability to contact enough people. Even so, Anderson has help cities across the world face and fight these problems. After all this, it still was not enough to stop violence it is in our nature and it will always exist, but that does not mean her approach is not just. Her methods are perfect and we all should join up with her methods. The only difference is it should be started at a local level. If we make a change in each community, eventually we will change the country, by default.

Anderson is a person worth listening too, and one who gets things done. She, like all of us, has struggled in the past and persevered due to her drive to be better. And although she needed help along the way, she realizes that as humans, as social creatures, we need each other. She is a living example of the American Dream. As a black woman, the odds were stacked against her. At first, it almost made her crumble, but in fact, she had beaten these odds and now helps other beat these odds. It takes a person who understands struggle to help someone struggling and this is why Anderson truly is a model from which our generation should take inspiration. If people can stop all the judgement and accept people who are not bad but just in a bad way, and once we can get past these barriers we may not totally stop violence but we can help make a safer happier world for all of us.